Wheeling-Pittsburgh Corp.’s top executive boasted of a turnaround for the troubled steelmaker now that it has $169 million to spend on improvements — thanks to a merger approved Tuesday with Chicago-based steel distributor Esmark Inc. “We believe Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel and Esmark will be a very profitable company. Looking at all of our assets, I am extremely confident. We now have the flexibility to make changes,” CEO James P. Bouchard told about 50 shareholders and union officials at a special shareholders meeting at the Hyatt Regency Hotel at the Pittsburgh International Airport. The merger was approved by 93 percent of Wheeling-Pitt’s shareholders and gives the company access to $169 million in equity and borrowing availability, said Bouchard, who is also CEO of Esmark. The voting puts a stamp of approval on a plan Bouchard introduced in March. Beginning today, Wheeling-Pitt’s stock will be replaced by Esmark Inc. on the New York Stock Exchange, Bouchard said. Steel industry analyst Charles Bradford of Bradford/Soleil Securities Inc. of New York was pessimistic about Wheeling-Pitt’s future, saying the company likely will lose more than $200 million this year, as “the fourth quarter is pretty bad.” In the third quarter, Wheeling-Pitt lost $56.5 million and revenue declined 18.6 percent to $393 million. Bouchard, however, was so confident about the new company’s future that he put his job on the line — even though he anticipates a downturn in the economy and a drop in the steel demand in 2008. “If the company is not profitable, I will not be here (in this job) next year,” Bouchard pledged. Under the new holding company structure, Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel will become a division of Esmark and its steelmaking facilities in West Virginia, Ohio and Allenport, Washington County, will be merged with Esmark’s network of steel service centers in the Midwest. For the Pittsburgh region, the merger means the addition of an executive and corporate office in Marshall, said Bouchard, who lives in Sewickley. Wheeling-Pitt plans to move between 70 and 100 employees to the new offices. Esmark will move its headquarters from Chicago to Wheeling, W.Va., where Wheeling-Pittsburgh’s headquarters have about 250 employees, Bouchard said. The move is likely to occur in the second quarter of 2008, spokesman Dennis Halpin said. Many of those filling the corporate office will come from Esmark’s Chicago’s headquarters and steel service centers in Ohio, Bouchard said. The fate of the Wheeling-Pittsburgh’s Allenport plant could be decided early next year, Bouchard said. Wheeling-Pitt’s executives have been meeting with USW officials to discuss what is the right size for the future of the company, he said. Neither Bouchard, nor his brother, Craig, president of Wheeling-Pittsburgh, offered hints on the future of the cold-rolled steel plant at Allenport. Wheeling-Pitt’s has considered moving Allenport’s operations to its Steubenville plant, in part because of the cost of transporting steel to and from its plants in Ohio. It also is considering reducing the number of weekly shifts at the plant, which could cut over half of the workforce, said William Kinney, president of USW Local 1187, which represents about 210 active workers. Transporting steel between Allenport and the company’s Ohio plants adds $40 a ton to the cost of its products, Craig Bouchard said. “I feel the plant could be profitable. We’re setting production records. It (the Allenport plant) needs capital improvements,” said Kinney, who hopes to meet with company officials in the next few weeks. Esmark also is closing in on a deal to buy the former Bethlehem Steel Corp.’s Sparrows Point steel mill near Baltimore, which is owned by ArcelorMittal. Craig Bouchard said that $1.35 billion deal could close within the next few weeks.

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